


Gone

by ShadowGale96



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-27
Updated: 2018-01-27
Packaged: 2019-03-10 00:37:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 897
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13493163
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ShadowGale96/pseuds/ShadowGale96
Summary: Levi never forgets. He doesn't look around surprised to see that is Erwin nowhere in sight. Never does he prepare a meal forgetting there is no one to eat it. He doesn’t go to Erwin’s room to collect the laundry that isn’t there. No. He knows Erwin is gone.





	Gone

**Author's Note:**

> I might change the title later. This inspired by fanarts I loved by seitsen-sarvi and februeruri who do awesome art. Enjoy!

Levi’s not an idiot

He had sat with him on that damned rooftop in a city of ruin. Their losses numbered gruesomely high. With the ashes of desolation surrounding them, Erwin’s ragged breathing came to an abrupt halt. Blue eyes that always held such an impassioned vibrancy… dulled. When Levi finally carried him down, he’d felt the stiffness of Erwin’s body.

Levi never forgets this. He knows Erwin is dead. The haunting bloodstain that had hugged the rim of his uniform for days reminded him. He doesn’t look ahead shocked to see Erwin nowhere in sight. Never does he prepare a meal, as he has done for years, forgetting there is no one to eat it. He doesn’t go to Erwin’s room to collect the laundry that isn’t there.

No. He knows Erwin is gone,

But that doesn’t stop Levi from waiting for him.

Small glances over his shoulder are what Levi allows himself. He looks around the room for the one person he’s ever allowed to give him direction, but Erwin is gone. And now Levi is lost. There’s this instinct deep inside. It tells him to follow Erwin, but he can’t. He won’t ever again. The realization sends a stabbing ache through his chest.

Erwin is never coming back.

Still, Levi’s eyes are drawn to the door waiting for it to open. He doesn’t expect it to. He knows it won’t, but there is part of him that hopes beyond all reason and rationality that his commander will defy death and walk back into his life. With hands firmly clasped behind his back, head held high, and eyes of stone. He is unbreakable, solid, and proud. But the door doesn’t open.

There is only silence as Levi shifts through the rest of Erwin’s things. Packing them up for storage. Tucking them away. There were so few people left to do it, so Levi took it upon himself to handle the dead’s belongings and get them back to their respective families. Erwin’s was the last room he had to clean. And Erwin’s things where the only things that had nowhere to go.

He had no living family, few friends, and fewer friends that were still living. He had no wife, no children, and no lover? In honesty, Levi didn’t know what name he’d give for what they were. With no one to legally claim Erwin’s belongings and no one to argue with, anything that was his was Levi’s to have. Which, predictably, was mostly books.

All manner of books filled his walls. History books, Geography books, Math, Grammar, etc. A few were even illegal. Knowing Erwin, it wasn’t a surprise. These piqued Levi’s curiosity. He picked one up taking note of its age through the dulled cover and loose spine. Flipping through the pages revealed several childish doodles carelessly drawn atop formal print.

Levi mocked him under his breath.

He continued flipping through the book. Each page revealed another crude drawing, innocent to what they were covering. The book was filled with images of the ocean. Blue waters and white sand. There were strange charts, shells, and small foreign looking creatures. There were notes in the margins as well. Notes written in an unfamiliar hand yet a familiar elegance. based on the doodles, this book had clearly once belonged to Erwin’s father. It would be very informative if not for the drawings.

On the last page, there’s a painting of a grand boat sailing into the horizon. Two people were drawn on top of it. In the picture’s sky were the words ‘Me and Papa’. Levi scoffed. Half expecting the E to be backwards, but no. Erwin, even as a child, wrote well.

Of course, Erwin would draw in his father’s books.

He closed the book. The noise echoed through the room’s deafening silence, filling it, if only for a moment.

It doesn’t feel right. None of it does. Pulling Erwin’s books from Erwin’s bookcase. They belonged here. They had always belonged here. As Levi placed the last book into a crate, he eased down sitting on the edge to inspect his work. The desk, clear. The shelves, bare. The room, emptier than he had ever seen it.

With a heavy sigh, Levi looked at the crates stacked close together waiting to be moved. The sun was setting and casting an orange-pink glow into the room. There wouldn’t be much daylight left to work with. These boxes still needed a home.

The one with his cloths, would be donated. All except his jacket that is. He didn’t have many personal effects to speak of, but what there was could, again, be donated. Most of the books were purely educational, so they could go to a library or even be kept at Headquarters for reading. But the last box…

These were the illegal books, probably not for long though. They were Erwin’s drawings and gifts from his father. They were the books Levi would catch him reading in quiet moments. These had meant something to Erwin.

Levi glanced over his shoulder looking towards the door. Waiting. What would Erwin want him to do? The door didn’t open, and no direction was given. Levi sat alone in the silence. He asked himself a different question. What did  **he**  want to do?

Levi took in a calming breath and decided. All of these precious belongings…

Those would be his.

 

 


End file.
